


Forced apart (but never severed)

by BadForTheHeart



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Actually I just made everything worse, Angst, Canon Divergence, Din is desperate, Episode: s02e14 The Tragedy, Fix-It, Gen, Jetpack action, The Mandalorian (TV) Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:28:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27881493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadForTheHeart/pseuds/BadForTheHeart
Summary: Din won’t let them take the kid. He won’t.But he’s not fast enough.
Comments: 11
Kudos: 108





	Forced apart (but never severed)

**Author's Note:**

> A short additional scene to the latest chapter, The Tragedy. I felt like Din’s reaction was downplayed a little, so I decided to hurt myself (and him) a bit more. (Rated T just in case.)

It feels like the mountaintop is getting further away, his legs too heavy, the rocks sturdy, an impenetrable line of defense that tries to separate him from the kid. But Din Djarin’s will’s been forged in fire, it’s durable like the beskar covering delicate secrets. He thinks he breathes fire, the sun is blinding his eyes, and the taste of sweat makes his stomach churn, but he keeps running. Still not fast enough. It’s like whatever energy is circling around this place tries to keep him away from the kid, putting pressure on his body, making the air a dense mass. Din Djarin is usually quite collected during a fight, but now he feels like desperation is growing a lump in his throat to choke him. Maybe it’s the beskar. But his armor never was uncomfortable before.

Something descends from the sky. Black figures swarm the seeing stone, and Din’s heartbeat speeds up. He wills his legs to work faster, but this invisible force keeps holding him back. Fennec Shand trails after him—he wants to shout at her, order her to run ahead, but he sees how sweat has already collected on her forehead and knows it’s no use.

He finally reaches the top, but just as he grabs his blaster, the troopers rise up again, and the only thing registering in Din’s mind is a desperate cry. Grogu. One of the troopers scoops him up, and suddenly, the world collapses. The kid’s dark eyes are shiny with unshed tears, his tiny hands reaching out towards his father.

Fennec tells something to Boba on radio, but Din doesn’t listen. He taps on his vambrace, and his jetpack flies to him, ready for action. Din attaches it to his back, and takes off without thinking.

The air still feels thick, and with every passing second, the troopers look smaller and smaller. Din’s muscles hurt, the cold seeps through his protection, cutting deep into his chest. He needs to go faster. Faster. Faster! Above him, Grogu is wiggling in the trooper’s solid hold, his face wrinkling in concentration. The trooper’s engine suddenly sputters out, and they drop out of the circle formed by the rest. Din is ready to catch the kid—for the first time since Tython’s sky has crashed, he feels like he’s finally close enough. But the other troopers react quickly, and start their descent to help out their fallen.

Din reaches their circle, and before he can grab Grogu, one of the troopers is on him, hitting pressure points and blocking his movements. Din made the mistake of underestimating them, their attacks are sharp, calculated, strong—they are machines, he realizes. The beskar is ringing in his ears, his vision is swimming. He latches onto one, and tries to fly away with it to break the formation, but the other three maneuver so fast as if the thick air isn’t affecting them at all. They are onto him again, and he’s flailing, but to no avail. They keep hitting his armor’s weak spots, depriving him from his blaster and knocking him out of balance.

Grogu is secure in their arms, his tears flying in small droplets in the loud wind. He lifts one hand, but his eyes start to droop, and whatever trick he is trying to do fails. Din wants to tell him that everything’s going to be okay, but he doesn’t believe it either. The troopers keep their strong hold on him, and one of them tears the jetpack off his back, while another smashes his vambrace.

Din steals one last glance from the kid, whose mouth sags, his tears now an unstoppable flow. _I’m sorry_ , he tries to say, but his words fail him. Then the troopers let go of him and he falls.

Grogu cries out, and his voice gets lost in the wind, but Din hears it anyway. It’s the only thing he hears. His senses go numb in the wind, his mind blank, his muscles unresponsive. The air is no longer holding him back, the ground is nearing way too fast, and the kid is nothing more but a tiny dot in the wide sky. The smaller he gets, the hungrier the void threatens to swallow Din, and he no longer has the strength to fight it off.

Just before he meets the ground, his fall slows down. His back still collides with the rocky surface hard, and he’s seeing stars, but he knows he shouldn’t have survived. He struggles to breathe, yet the panic doesn’t poison his mind. It feels like Grogu is close by, the air vibrates like it does when he uses his powers. But once Din manages to catch his breath, the sensation has vanished.

Grogu is not a dot anymore in the sky. He’s nothing. _Gone_.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not crying. I’m not.  
> English is not my mother tongue, so I hope it’s not that bad.


End file.
